Adam is a common masculine given name.
The personal name Adam derives from the Hebrew noun ha adamah meaning "the ground" or "earth". It is still a Hebrew given name, and its Quranic and Biblical usage has ensured that it is also a common name in all countries which draw on these traditions. It is particularly common in Christian- and Muslim-majority countries. In most languages its spelling is the same, although the pronunciation varies somewhat. Adán is the Spanish form of this name.
Adam is also a surname in many countries, although it is not as common in English as its derivative Adams (sometimes spelled Addams). In other languages there are similar surnames derived from Adam, such as Adamo, Adamov, Adamowicz, Adamski etc.
In Arabic, Adam (آدم) means "made from the earth/mud/clay".
Roger Adam was a French aircraft designer and manufacturer who produced light aircraft in kit from 1948 to 1955. He established the firm Etablissements Aeronautiques R. Adam.
Adam is a fictional character; from the Ravenloft campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game.
Adam was a major character in the 1994 novel, Mordenheim, written by Chet Williamson.
Adam is the darklord of Lamordia. Known as Mordenheim's Monster or the Creature, he is an extremely intelligent and nimble dread flesh golem, based on Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Adam is the most successful creation of Dr. Victor Mordenheim in his research into the creation of life, albeit the one that causes him grief unmeasured. Adam reduced the doctor's wife Elise to a vegetative state and apparently murdered their adopted daughter Eva.
The two are inextricably bound together: Dr. Mordenheim has Adam's immortality, and in return Adam shares the doctor's anguish.
Usually hidden from sight, Adam is believed to spend most of his time on the Isle of Agony, part of the archipelago known as the Finger.
X/1872 X1, occasionally referred to as "Pogson's Comet", was a probable cometary astronomical object seen from Madras (now Chennai) on December 3 and 4, 1872, by astronomer N. R. Pogson.
Pogson believed the object to be the lost Comet Biela, but subsequent orbital calculations have suggested that this was unlikely. Neither Biela's Comet nor Pogson's object have been recovered since, and the episode remains one of the most puzzling in solar system astronomy.
Pogson's observations were triggered by a great meteor shower (later known as the Andromedids) seen on November 27, 1872: its radiant was observed to be located in a part of the sky which Biela's Comet, last seen in 1852, had been predicted to cross in September, and it was speculated that it might be associated with the comet. As a result, the astronomer Ernst Friedrich Wilhelm Klinkerfues sent a telegram to Pogson, at the Madras Observatory, stating that "Biela touched Earth on 27th: search near Theta Centauri".
Pogson began searching for the comet at around 4 a.m. local time on the 3rd, after cloudy weather had hampered observations for two nights. The clouds broke up for a period of around ten minutes, and at 05.15 he spotted an object, "evidently cometary at the first glance", which he recorded as "circular, bright, with a decided nucleus": he identified it to his satisfaction as Biela's Comet by comparing its rate of motion against background stars. On the following morning he made further observations under better conditions, stating that the apparent comet now had a short tail. The morning of the 5th was cloudy, and Pogson immediately dispatched several letters noting his observations and giving three detailed positions, although admitting he had failed to spot the second of the two cometary heads seen on the previous observed return of Comet Biela.